Small-class guarantee will deepen first-year law school experience

“With this change, we’re trying to give students an experience they can’t get anywhere else.”

Luis E. Chiesa, vice dean for academic affairs

University at Buffalo Law School

BUFFALO, N.Y. — University at Buffalo Law School students
in their critical and formative first year will receive even more
personal attention from their professors under a new plan approved
unanimously by the school’s faculty.

First-year students already undergo intensive instruction and
coaching in research and writing skills. Beginning in fall 2015,
they also will spend one of the six first-year doctrinal courses
— covering such areas as contracts, property law and torts
— in a very small class of about 15 students.

The change, first proposed by an internal committee on
curriculum planning, means first-years will have more one-on-one
interaction with their professors, fostering their analytical and
advocacy skills early in their law school careers.

“Historically — here and at many other law schools
— doctrinal courses are taught to a big group of students,
anywhere from 50 to 80,” says Professor Luis E. Chiesa, who
as vice dean for academic affairs is responsible for overseeing the
curriculum. “With this change, we’re trying to give
students an experience they can’t get anywhere
else.”

Although almost half of U.S. law schools have a similar
arrangement, Chiesa says, “What is distinctive is how small
our sections will be.” Other schools’
“small” sections might have as many as 30 or 40
students; “ours will have half of that, which allows
professors to do much more with students.”

One advantage of the new arrangement is that it maximizes
student-professor interaction in that substantive class. “In
a typical class of 60, each student may get called on three or four
times over the semester,” Chiesa says. “That limits the
opportunity to interact with students and help them develop skills
in public speaking and oral argument. Now, we’ll have that
opportunity 12 or 16 times in a small section.”

In addition, he says, the bonding experience of an intensive,
small section develops solidarity and community among students.
“They’re in a more intimate setting, getting to know
and understand each other better, learning each other’s views
better. This has been shown to make for a more robust educational
experience,” Chiesa says. And because professors have fewer
students, they have more flexibility in what work they require
— more quizzes, perhaps, or more writing assignments —
because the work of grading is reduced.

With the change opening up more sections of 1L doctrinal
courses, UB Law faculty who currently don’t teach first-year
students now will have the chance to do so. “We can do this
with existing resources,” Chiesa says. “It’s a
matter of redeploying faculty to help out in this very worthwhile
endeavor.”

Only tenured and tenure-track faculty teach the first-year
doctrinal courses.

“I love teaching in the first semester,” says
Chiesa, a specialist in criminal law. “I like when students
don’t really have a sense of what the law means and you can
instill that sense in them. It’s really satisfying to see
that grow.”